Flames prospect Martin Pospisil receives 12 game USHL suspension

2018 Flames draft pick and noted hothead Martin Pospisil made minor waves in the larger world of hockey news when he was caught on video attempting to jump the boards and have, at the very least, a less-than-amicable discussion with an opposing fan.

Today, the hammer has fallen, and Pospisil has received one of the harshest penalties in USHL history: a 12 game suspension.

Sioux City's Martin Pospisil suspended 12 games for a combination of spearing, abuse of officials, and an altercation he was involved in with a fan at Omaha last Friday. He'll be back for the playoffs, but this is still the longest suspension I have seen in my 3 years in the U

Pospisil’s infractions was documented in this week’s prospect update. In Sioux City’s game against Omaha, Pospisil had been sent to the box, where Omaha fans had begun throwing garbage at him. According to various sources, he was pelted with a lighter and other things that shouldn’t be thrown at people, and Pospisil threw them back at the fans.

The video in the prospect update – which is just an 11-second snippet and not an objective record of the whole incident – clearly shows a fan in front throwing something at Pospisil, which set him off and climbing up the boards. Security officials removed Pospisil before any fists could go flying.

The suspension breaks down into one game for spearing, two for abuse of officials, and nine for the altercation. The USHL doesn’t keep great records of its suspension history, but this is certainly the longest in recent memory.

Pospisil will be eligible to return March 22 against, ironically, Omaha, at the exact same arena where this incident has happened. Hopefully everyone involved has a short memory, and in case they don’t, hopefully Omaha has installed taller glass panes around the penalty box.

Interestingly the fan in question was not thrown out of the game. If I am Sioux City I refuse to play in that arena unless the league takes steps to protect the players…ie. Higher Glass around the penalty box and security that will toss fans that engage inappropriately with the players.

I can hope the fan received something commensurate. Grown man chucking garbage at a kid sitting in the penalty box? That’s world class douchery. Part of me wishes Pospisil was able to drag him over the glass and into the box Tie Domi style.

Just what the Flames need!! Truculence. Sign him up and bring him to Calgary. Hopefully, some of that attitude will rub off on gentle giants like Janko and Monny. Then we might need to pair him (Pospisil) with Byng to calm him Seriously, Flames could use more truculence but we can do without the Tom Wilson type of studpidity.